1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device and method for operating a Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC). More particularly, the present invention relates to a device and method for supporting a mobile terminal that independently or compositely accesses modules included in the UICC regardless of a communications mode.
2. Description of the Related Art
A Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC) is a chip card including a module for supporting various services of a mobile terminal. A UICC may be used for a mobile device on a Global System For Mobile Telecommunications (GSM) network and a Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS) network.
The UICC provides security and maintenance for various personal data in the mobile terminal and has storage capacity of several hundred kilo bytes. Based on additional services of the UICC, the storage capacity of the UICC can be expanded. The UICC includes a Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) in the GSM mode, while having a Universal SIM (USIM) in the UMTS mode. The UICC can include some applications and provide storage for telephone numbers or other applications.
The conventional UICC supports a connection to the GSM network by using a SIM application, while supporting the connection to the UMTS network by using a USIM application. A smart card for the UICC may include a Central Processing Unit (CPU), a Read Only Memory (ROM), a Random Access Memory (RAM), an Electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EEPROM) and an Input/Output (I/O) circuit. Since the card slot is standardized, a subscriber can easily extract a personal account on the UICC and his own telephone number to transfer to other mobile devices. A telephone directory or a text message can also be transferred.
The conventional UICC has limitations in using services, which are used based on a corresponding network, of various stored application programs, such as, the service of using a transportation card a Digital Rights Management (DRM) and the service of downloading contents. That is, when a specific communications mode is used for a specific module among various application modules stored in the UICC, it is impossible to operate an application module having an interface that is not compatible with the specific communications mode. Accordingly, it is impossible for the conventional UICC to support various services.
In other words, when the conventional UICC is mounted with the SIM/USIM module used in connection with the GSM and UMTS communications network, it is impossible to access another service module for utilizing a specific service module. Accordingly, the use of various application services mounted in the UICC are restricted. Since voice service (telephone) is a basic service in a mobile communications terminal, other services cannot be accessed when utilizing the voice service.
Therefore, a need exists for a device and method for providing an interface for accessing modules in a UICC of a mobile terminal.